Julaften
by nightingalenelson
Summary: At a traditional Christmas Eve celebration, Kristoff has too much to drink and meets an enchanting girl. One-shot.


The bonfire burned bright in the winter months. Kristoff didn't know what they did for Christmas elsewhere, but lighting a big fire and drinking _juleol_ was as good a way as any. He took a big gulp from his near-empty mug and threw the dregs into the fire. Christmas was one of the only exceptions to his "stay-away-from-people" rule. Sven didn't like it, but he was usually calmed by the extra carrots Kristoff gave him as a present every year.

"_God jul_."

Kristoff started a moment. He hadn't noticed the girl walk up behind him.

"_God jul_."

He stared into his empty mug and thought about family. The trolls always did a lot of fun stuff for Christmas, and they always waited to hold their celebrations till he was back home, but there were a lot of things humans did that his adopted family just didn't grasp. Suddenly, he realized the strange girl was still there, and she was saying something.

"I'm sorry, what?"

"I said, would you like to dance?"

Kristoff stared at her, his mind going in a thousand different directions, many of them having to do with the fact that she was really quite lovely with those flowers in her ginger hair and the fact that no one ever asked him for a dance. Eventually, enough of his mind came to a consensus that he could squeak out a "Yes." She took his hands and pulled him into the dancing circle near the fire, and the small part of his mind that wasn't boggling at her recognized the song as "Musevisa".

When nights are getting longer, and lakes will freeze to ice;  
>Father Mouse warns strongly about a foul device:<br>"If we avoid the mouse trap, we will have naught to fear.  
>We'll all be celebrating, at Christmas time this year."<p>

And she really was lovely. Her pretty ginger hair was wavy and long, with a circlet of flowers braided into it with a pale thread. Her dress was simple but clean, with a touch of elegant rosemaling which somehow complemented her nicely tanned complexion without detracting from it.

Heyday and howdy and toodeladdeloo;  
>A Merry Christmas season is good for me and you.<p>

She was singing along with the chorus, and she had a lovely voice. He really couldn't help singing counterpoint, and were the other ice harvesters staring at him or was that just his imagination?

Heyday and howdy and toodeladdeloo;  
>A Merry Christmas season is good for me and you.<p>

She was a very good dancer, and she kept him from tripping over his own feet more than once. She had very little feet, and she was very quick and light. From her actions, it was evident that she found the quick twirls and spins of the old folk dance exhilarating and not a bit exhausting. The next verse started, and he could have sworn that more of the dancers were starting to sing.

Mother Mouse is cleaning, each ceiling and each wall.  
>She wants a home that's cosy, when Yuletide snowflakes will fall.<br>A grubby home at Christmas, would be a great disgrace.  
>So young ones dance a Polka, their tails sweep out the place.<p>

He lost track of the verses as his mouth kept singing, while his brain was utterly enraptured with the girl flickering in the firelight. Eventually, the song ended, and she pulled him out of the whirling circle to a set of market stalls, where it seemed to his delusional mind they giggled and gossiped about nothing in particular until they got up to the front and she bought a loaf of _julekake_ and pot of mutton ribs with _surkal_ before running off to spread out a checked napkin, and all Kristoff could think about was the fact that she'd definitely been at the _juleol_ too and if they were drunk then he hoped to remember what had happened this night, and all the while his mouth kept going on about this and that.

He wasn't sure how long it took them to finish the mutton ribs, but eventually he noticed they were gone and dragged her off to treat her to some Christmas rice pudding, and _oh my god was this a date oh well_ and somehow his dazed mind picked up on the fact that her name was Anna, and if this was a date with her then he prayed neither of them remembered anything the next morning.

The next thing he knew they had both found almonds in their pudding and so he bought a marzipan pig and told her they had to split it and he took it in his teeth and suddenly the world slowed down around him, because she had taken the other half in her teeth and bitten it off but instead of taking her mouth away she leaned in further and kissed him, and it suddenly occurred to him that this had to be a dream, so he kissed her back and that was when his head cleared with a shock.

With his face this close to hers, he could clearly see the pale ribbon in her hair, and it wasn't a ribbon after all. He had only assumed that because he had only seen hair that color once, and that was thirteen years ago, the night he found his way to the Valley of Living Rock behind the people he now knew to be the old King and Queen. One of their daughters had hair all over like that, and the other had a single streak. The first was Princess Elsa, the one who had shut herself in her room, and the other was Princess Anna, the girl he now knew himself to be kissing.

With a shock, he pulled away and mumbled something about having to check on his reindeer, which made her laugh. He walked away as calmly as possible, over to something which looked more like a mountain of fur than Sven. Sven knew when Kristoff was in no fit shape to mount, ride, and steer properly, so he knelt and let the mountain man drape himself over the reindeer's broad back. Sven then stood and set off for the Valley of Living Rock as fast as he could go without spilling his half-conscious rider.

Half an hour and a steaming mug of Grand Pabbie's hangover cure later, a woozy Kristoff managed to spill the basics of his story. The old troll reluctantly agreed to remove both Kristoff and Anna's memories of the meeting, and swore the other trolls to secrecy. Kristoff remained puzzled as to his family's new preoccupation with finding him a girlfriend, Anna had puzzling dreams about rice pudding, Kai made the remaining castle staff swear not to let slip the fact that Anna had got out, Elsa noticed nothing, and on the whole life continued as normal until Anna and Kristoff met again three months later in a trading post the day of the Great Freeze and proved right an old troll saying: "When life happens, roll with it or it rolls over you."


End file.
